


Wrongful Imprinting

by Calacious



Category: Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Angst, Baby, F/F, First Time, Fluff, Pining, Slow Build, riverside sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-06
Updated: 2013-12-11
Packaged: 2017-12-10 13:59:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/786828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/pseuds/Calacious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leah was already different than everyone else. She was an outsider even amongst outsiders. When she imprints on someone she shouldn't, she decides to run away. Fate decides to intervene.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pining

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SpaghettiTacos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaghettiTacos/gifts).



> This was written in response to the mere suggestion by SpaghettiTacos of Leah and Rosalie as a pair.
> 
> P.O.V. switches between Leah and Rosalie. Starts off with heavy angst that builds to a release (kind of like coming to a climax...I hope) and then ends with heavy fluff.

She was supposed to imprint on someone else. Leah knew that with every sinew of her being – both human and wolf, and yet it was the wolf that pined. So, she avoided shifting, stayed at La Push, and closed herself off to the rest of her pack.

 

 The others knew that she had ‘imprinted’, but they didn’t know who she’d imprinted on. They assumed it was someone good and strong and male. Teased her about imprinting on Sam and Emily’s newborn boy, like Jacob had imprinted on Renesemee.

 

If anything, who she had imprinted on was much worse. If she’d imprinted on little Elijah, there might be some hope for her. It would have been awkward as hell, but at least it wouldn’t have been shameful and revolting. She could have become little Eli’s protector as he grew up, her own growth retarded to match his, and eventually, when he was old enough, they’d marry and start a family of their own.

 

Her transformation from ordinary human to shape-shifting protector of the people of La Push and Forks had been the worst thing to happen to her. It was even worse than losing Sam Uley’s affections had been. Heartache vs. being a freak of nature, even amongst her own people, had really taken a toll on her.  Her life hadn’t been easy to begin with, but now it was something straight out of a nightmare. A nightmare she’d never be able to wake up from.

 

* * *

 

Rosalie traced a thin, silver scar that ran along the outer edge of Emmett’s left hip with a manicured nail. It was a scar which Bella had left on him when they’d been ‘sparring’ for ‘fun’. He’d laughed about it. Rosalie hadn’t.

 

Vampires weren’t supposed to scar. They weren’t supposed to get hurt. Period.

 

They weren’t human, and any semblance they had to humans, other than in their looks, was jarring to her. She’d been robbed of her humanity by a cruel, heartless man, and had been gifted with immortality by Carlisle, who, even though he had no beating heart, was far more humane than the man Rosalie had hoped to marry. She’d killed him, and his friends, for what they had done to her. She didn’t regret taking their lives. Not even now.

 

“Hey,” Emmett’s voice broke through her dark thoughts. He caught her hand up in his own and kissed her knuckles. “Penny for your thoughts…”

 

Rosalie regarded her lover impartially. She loved him. Or, had loved him, once upon a time. But now, even with his lips caressing her skin, she wasn’t so certain of their love any more.

 

She’d moved heaven and earth to be with him, carrying him over a hundred miles to Carlisle when he’d been attacked by a bear. He would have died, but she had refused to let that happen. Circle of life and death be damned.

 

She’d been lonely at the time. Had missed her human life, the promise of it, and what she’d wanted out of it – love, a child. Simple things, really. What every young girl dreamed of. It had been stolen from her, in what had been a matter of minutes, but had felt like forever, and she’d never really gotten over it.

 

Emmett had reminded her of her friend’s, Vera’s, baby boy. Looking at him now, with his skin a perfect alabaster, dimples fetchingly etched into his cheeks, and his dark, curly hair, she could no longer see her friend’s baby boy. That was a good thing. Or, it should be. They were lovers, after all. One should not liken her lover to a child, Dr. Freud’s theories aside.

 

Smiling, she declined to answer his question, and kissed him instead. Straddling him, she poured every last remnant of herself into the kiss, hoping that she was wrong about what her unbeating heart was trying to tell her – had been trying to tell her for a couple of months now.

 

Had they needed to breathe, she’d have stolen his breath – much as she had stolen his death from him so many years ago. But, they didn’t need to breathe. Didn’t need to think. Didn’t need to feel.

 

They could kiss for an eternity, maybe longer, but Rosalie broke off the kiss not long after she’d started it. She frowned, and, if she could have cried, she would have. She didn’t love Emmett, much as she’d feared, and judging by the look on the vampire’s face, he realized it too.

 

He smiled, brushed a wisp of hair out of the corner of her mouth, and tucked it behind her ear. The smile didn’t reach his eyes. It hurt her when he hurt, but she couldn’t make herself love him. Maybe she’d never really loved him in the first place, but had been clinging to a past she’d been unable to let go of until now.

 

“It’s okay, Rose,” he whispered.

 

It wasn’t okay, though. Wouldn’t be okay for a long time to come. Rosalie knew that, but she returned Emmett’s smile, and then got up and dressed.


	2. Watching

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leah watches Jacob with Renesemee, and not with envy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story requires a suspense of disbelief.

Leah watched Jacob and Renesemee as they played together in the copse of trees that bordered the Cullen property. It was innocent, but there was no mistaking the love that burned brightly in Jacob’s eyes, and though she’d done her best to close off her heart and the connection that she had with her pack, she could _feel_ the love emanating from her pack mate and the object of his affection.

A freak of nature, much like herself and Jacob, Renesemee was pretty and loving – young. An innocent child born into a world filled with hatred and ugliness. Not quite vampire, but not quite human, Renesemee was a puzzle, or maybe the missing link that Leah had read about in her science class.

What was clear, though, was that Renesemee loved Jacob, and Jacob loved her even more than life itself. He’d die for her, and Leah wondered if that was reciprocal – if Renesemee would risk her life for Jacob. She doubted it, because imprinting was wholly unique to the Quileute shape-shifters. That they just so happened to shift into wolves led outsiders to believe that they were werewolves. It was a ridiculous misconception.

When Jacob had imprinted on Renesemee, it had forged a new treaty between the Quileute tribe and Cullen family, much to Leah’s chagrin. Objects of an imprint couldn’t be harmed by anyone in the pack. Apparently it didn’t matter who the imprint was – bloodsucking monster or not. They had no say in the process; it was some kind of biological imperative.

_A forced love_ , Leah thought with bitterness that she’d honed over the past several months. She turned away from the happy duo, and kept her senses focused on their surroundings. It was making her sick, watching the two of them, listening to Renesemee’s cheerful laughter, and Jacob’s thoughts which centered around the little girl.

“Hey, sis,” Seth startled her and she growled at him. He laughed.

Though she knew that they were related by blood, Leah often wondered if one of them hadn’t been adopted, or dropped onto the planet by a group of aliens. Surely in a world where bloodsuckers and her kind could exist, aliens were a plausible possibility as well.

Where Seth was lighthearted and kind, easily given to laughter, she was dark and bitter, easily given to anger. They rarely saw eye-to-eye, and he irked her with his easy approach to life and love. He loved everyone. She didn’t.

People needed to earn love, not be graciously gifted with it by some innate impulse they were unable to control. Sam had earned her love, but it had come to nothing when he’d shifted and imprinted on Emily. The worst thing was that she couldn’t hate either of them for it, even though she really, really wanted to.

“What’s wrong?” Seth asked with an uncharacteristic frown. He sidled up next to her, sitting beside her with an easy, enviable grace.

“Nothing,” she said, ignoring his playful shoulder bump.

Joy-filled laughter drifted over to them, and Leah clenched her jaw, something which did not go unnoticed by Seth. He gave her a knowing look. A look that she shouldn’t be seeing on the face of her young, carefree baby brother.

Seth was supposed to be going to school, flirting with girls his age, and sneaking out late at night to party and experiment with drugs. He wasn’t supposed to be guarding his people and worrying about the fate of his older sister. The weight of the world should not be on her little brother’s shoulders, no matter if it was a shared burden.

“You’ve imprinted, haven’t you?” Seth asked.

Leah stiffened, but turned away from her brother, refusing to answer, and knowing that it would be all the answer that he needed.

“Who is it?” Seth was unperturbed by her lack of answer, merely pulled her into a half-hug, and rested his head on her shoulder. “You can tell me.”

She shook her head. Jacob imprinting on Renesemee had been scandalous enough. If the pack learned who it was that she’d imprinted on, it wouldn’t be pretty.

“No, Seth, I really can’t tell you,” Leah said, sighing. She planted a kiss on the top of his head and ruffled his hair.

She stood, brushing off her jeans, and then turned and ran. She wanted to put as much distance between herself and Cullen land as possible. Somewhere along the way, she shed her clothing, along with her human form.

* * *

 

“ _Why_ must he be here?” Rosalie asked, not really expecting an answer.

She flicked her hair, and turned from the window where she’d been watching Jacob and Renesemee. She loved her niece, but hated Jacob Black, and the fact that he’d bonded with her. It was unnatural. Disgusting. Her stomach twisted, and she knew that she was being a hypocrite, but she didn’t care.

Edward frowned at her. “If Bella and I can accept it, you should be able to as well.”

Rosalie snorted, and gave her adopted brother an indulgent look. She raised an eyebrow, and then shook her head when he averted his gaze toward the window. She laughed, bitterly and laid a hand on Edward’s shoulder.

“You haven’t accepted it as readily as you’d like the rest of us to believe,” Rosalie guessed. “Outward appearances aside, you want to rip Jacob’s head off, even more than I do, but you know that Nessie would never forgive you if you did.”

Edward chuckled, but didn’t deny the truth of her words. His eyes narrowed as he watched his daughter – a daughter that should not have been possible for him, or any of them to have – and Jacob. The two were laughing – Renesemee’s cheeks were pink, her eyes shining with mirth and love. Edward clenched his fists and his jaw when Jacob lifted the pre-teen and twirled her around and around, eliciting more giggles from her.

“He loves her,” Rosalie said, unsure why she’d been prompted to say anything at all. Maybe it was the way that Renesemee was looking at Jacob. It was the same way that Emmett had once looked at her, and the way that Carlisle, even after all of these years, still looked at Esme, Edward at Bella, and Alice at Jasper.

She didn’t like Jacob Black, didn’t know that she ever would. Even though he and his dog pack had stood side-by-side with them against the Volturi, Rosalie couldn’t reconcile the fact that he was, in essence, a grown man in love with her young niece. She didn’t understand the whole imprinting thing, and didn’t understand how Edward and Bella could accept it so easily.

“I know,” Edward said. “That’s what makes it so hard.”

Rosalie frowned.

“It’d be easier to hate Jacob if I wasn’t privy to his thoughts,” Edward confessed. “I don’t understand imprinting any better than you do. Not even they fully understand how it works,” he said, gesturing toward Jacob and Seth who had joined the two.

Rosalie flashed on an image of Leah, and she immediately shook it from her mind. She hadn’t seen the young woman recently, and thought it odd that Leah hadn’t been around. She ignored the way her stomach seemed to do a little flip-flop when she thought about the different possibilities for Leah’s absence.

Edward gave her an odd look, but didn’t say anything to break the silence that had settled between them as they watched the three. She knew that, given Edward’s unique abilities, her breakup with Emmett wasn’t a secret. It probably wasn’t a secret from Jasper either, but neither vampire had said anything to anyone else, and for that, she was grateful.

She and Emmett would tell the family, and soon, but not today. She fingered the locket around her neck, and tried not to think of Leah’s recent absenteeism as she watched her niece play. She wished that she could be as carefree and innocent again.

Edward clasped her hand in his own, and together, they stood at the window and watched. Edward with a tight smile fixed firmly in place, and she with a stab of jealousy which she disguised with a look of haughty indifference. 


	3. Meet Me at the River

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rosalie's mother had never taken the time to share the whole birds and the bees story with her, and she really didn't understand what was happening to her, why she was drawn to another woman, instead of the man that she'd fallen for and begged Carlisle to turn.

Leah didn’t mind being alone. Actually, she reveled in it. She enjoyed solitude, and wide-open spaces.

When being inside her wolf’s skin became almost too unbearable – irrational pining for the one she couldn’t have, in spite of the imprint – she shifted, hoping to be able to close herself off to the overwhelming feelings. It was like being burned from the inside out, and she wanted to shed, not only her skin, but everything that made her who she was.

She’d traveled as far away from La Push as she dared, and was happy that she no longer felt the pull of the pack. It was quiet; the only sound for miles away was that of birds, and the river that she’d taken a drink from in her wolf form.

Comfortable in her own skin for the first time in what felt like forever, Leah waded, naked, into the river. She shivered, but welcomed the cold water against her heated skin. Taking a deep breath, she slipped beneath the surface of the water and swam into the middle of the river.

She pushed her way to the surface when her lungs started to burn, and gulped in mouthfuls of air like a newborn baby. Smiling for the first time since she’d imprinted, Leah flipped onto her back and floated in the water, her arms and legs spread wide.

She knew that, aside from the wild animals that lived in the area, she was completely alone. There was no fear of being caught in the nude, not that she would mind if she was. If people wanted to stare at her, let them. She had nothing to hide.

* * *

 

“Are you sure that you don’t want any company?” Emmett asked quietly.

“I’ll be fine,” Rosalie said for what must’ve been the hundredth time. She smiled, and brushed the tips of her fingers over her former lover’s lips.

They’d told the family, and things had gone over as well as she’d anticipated – which wasn’t well at all. Carlisle and Esme had taken it the worst. Alice had seen it coming well before even she and Emmett had, but she hadn’t said anything, and for that, Rosalie was grateful. Jasper had noticed something was off about the two of them, but he’d kept it to himself, as had Edward.

“Be careful,” Emmett said needlessly.

“I will. Don’t worry,” Rosalie said, “I’ll be back.”

“Promise?” Emmett’s eyes locked on hers as though he’d be able to discern her thoughts and sift lies from the truth.

Rosalie smiled, and impulsively gave her former lover a hug, squeezing him tightly, part of her hoped that it would awaken the feelings that she used to have for him. It didn’t, and she reluctantly released him. She didn’t understand why, after all of these years, her feelings for Emmett would change from that of erotic love to that of brotherly love.

“I promise,” she said, realizing, for the first time since she’d decided to go off on her own, that she meant it, that she intended to come back. “This is my family, my home. I’ll come back once I’ve fed and cleared my head.”

“I’ll miss you,” Emmett said.

“We all will,” Alice added, hugging her tightly. Rosalie hadn’t even heard her sister approach, but she was grateful for her presence.

“Thank you.” Her heart swelled with love for the slight vampire.

“You’ll be back to us,” Alice said with a certainty that Rosalie didn’t yet feel. “When it happens, don’t question it too much,” she added with a mysterious, knowing smile. “It’ll all work out in the end, better than you could even begin to imagine. You’ll see.”

Rosalie gave her a questioning look, but Alice shook her head and then gave her another quick hug. With a wink, Alice tugged on Emmett’s hand and pulled him back to the house, leaving Rosalie alone. Shaking off thoughts about what her sister’s words could possibly mean, she turned away from the house, where she could feel the eyes of her family on her, and ran.

The sun kissed Leah’s skin, bathing her in welcome warmth. Eyes closed, cool water lapping at her bare skin, Leah felt at ease, boneless and free from everything.

She pulled her arms down to her side and her legs together, propelling herself backwards. Relishing the way that the water moved around her body, pulling at her hair, causing it to swirl and fan around her head, she felt some of the tension she’d been carrying since she’d imprinted on Rosalie Hale, leave her body.

She was free. Free from herself and from innate urges that she had no control over. She hated what she’d become, and that she would never be completely free from it, but it felt good to pretend for just a little while.

* * *

 

Rosalie caught scent of her prey, a white-tailed doe, and she cocked her head to the side and listened. There was no sign of a fawn nearby. The doe was alone. She could hear the trickling waters of a river, and birds overhead, and what might be a heartbeat, but it didn’t concern her, because it was too far away to be a witness.

She hated being a monster, hated that she needed to kill such a beautiful creature in order to survive, but she knew this too was a part of the ongoing cycle of life. If she didn’t kill the doe, the mountain lion she’d passed several miles ago would.

A wide, feral grin spread across her face, and she purposefully stepped on a twig, relishing the prospect of a chase before the inevitable kill. The doe did not disappoint. Her head whipped up from the grass that she’d been grazing, and her nostrils flared. Her ears twitched as her muscles tensed. Rosalie tensed in anticipation of the hunt, and then the doe raised her tail, the signal to others of her kind that danger lay in wait for them.

With a slight twitch, the deer was off at a dead run. Rosalie counted to ten, slowly, and then she took off after the deer. The doe led her in the direction of the river, but Rosalie caught up to the frightened animal, just before it reached the outer edge of the bank.

The doe knew that she was going to die, and she stopped running. She faced Rosalie with a bravery that belied her fear. Her nostrils flared, and she chuffed as she faced her death with a dignity and grace that Rosalie admired.

Rosalie moved lightning quick, breaking the doe’s neck with a single twist, and then she sunk her teeth into the warm flesh and drank. She could feel the doe’s blood coursing down the back of her throat and into her own veins, replenishing her. Once the doe had cooled, and she’d divested her of every ounce of blood, Rosalie pulled away and licked the remnant of blood from her lips. Using the back of her hand, she wiped at the blood which had spilled from her mouth and down her chin.

Sated, Rosalie walked to the water’s edge. She knelt in the silt, and let the cool water run over her hands until there was no longer a trace of the doe’s blood on them. Then, cupping her hands, she gathered water into them and washed her face.

This ritual of washing the blood from her hands and face made her feel less like a monster, and for at least a few, brief moments, she could pretend that she wasn’t. She took a sip of the cool water, even though she didn’t need it, and wondered what it would be like to be human again.

The sound of the heartbeat she’d heard earlier was stronger here at the water’s edge, and Rosalie raised her hands from the water. She tilted her head and listened, trying to discern where the owner of the heartbeat was.

The sound was distorted by the rush of water, and Rosalie scanned the opposite shoreline, certain that it was where she’d find the strange animal. It wasn’t a heartbeat that she recognized, and yet there was something familiar about it that niggled at the recesses of her mind and told her she ought to recognize it.

The unhurried tha thump, tha thump of the heart called to her, and she frowned. Standing to her full height, Rosalie shielded her eyes from the bright sun that shone overhead, and she squinted at the surface of the water as the sun glinted off of it, nearly blinding her.

She almost missed the owner of the strangely familiar heartbeat, and would have, had a cloud not chosen that moment to glide across the face of the sun, momentarily shrouding it, and affording her an  unrestricted view of her quarry. It was a woman, and Rosalie regarded her with stark objectivity, as though she was a scientist looking at a cell beneath a microscope.

The woman was short in stature. Her skin had a russet tone to it – darkened by the sun’s rays, and perhaps heritage. The woman’s dark hair, though short, spread out around her head like a halo.

She was floating on her back arms bent back behind her head. The woman’s bare breasts, round and pert, nipples standing at attention, no doubt from the cold of the water, drew her eye. Rosalie forced her gaze away from them, only to find her attention drawn to the curly nest of downy black hair nestled between the woman’s legs, spread wide in the water. If she’d have been capable of it, Rosalie knew that she would be blushing.

She hadn’t looked at another female like this since her late teens, when she and Vera had been ‘practicing’ kissing. She’d never admitted to her best friend that she’d liked the kiss a lot more than she probably should have, that it had made her stomach feel funny – like there were butterflies flying around inside of it – her breasts hard, and that she’d felt an uncomfortable sensation between her legs that had only subsided when she’d touched herself after Vera had gone home.

Rosalie’s mother had never explained the birds and the bees to her. She hadn’t warned her about men. Hadn’t told her about the intensity of emotions associated with sex and lust. Hadn’t told her anything which could have helped her be more aware of the dangers of associating with men, and which might have spared her the pain of being raped and then murdered.

Even so, as a young woman, she’d known that attraction to someone of the same sex was somehow _wrong._ She wanted children, wanted to be a mother more than anything else in the world, and Rosalie knew that she needed a man in order for that to happen.

Over the past several decades, Rosalie had watched the world around her change while she remained the same. She’d fallen in love with Emmett, not because he was a man, so much as because he was there, and he reminded her of something that she’d always thought that she wanted.

Standing at the water’s edge, unable to take her eyes off the naked woman, even when the cloud moved away from the sun and the glint of it off of the water started to hurt her eyes, Rosalie questioned some of the decisions she’d made in her life. The sudden attraction to this stranger wasn’t one that she could act upon, and yet she wanted to. She wanted to run her hands over the woman’s skin, touch her breasts, lick a path along her stomach from navel to pubic hair, and taste her lips.

When the woman stretched her limbs and flipped over, diving beneath the surface of the river, Rosalie held a breath that she didn’t even need to take. She let it out when the head of the beauty in the water broke the surface. Their eyes met, and locked, and Rosalie bit back a curse.

 _Leah Clearwater,_ Rosalie’s mind supplied the name.

It felt as though her dead heart had been jumpstarted, and she blinked at the vision that the young, naked woman made as Leah Clearwater swam toward her. The water had masked the pungent scent of the shape-shifter, and Rosalie wasn’t sure how she felt about it.

Furious with herself and the mother who’d never taught her a damn thing about love and life, Rosalie wanted to turn away from the river and run back to the Cullens, to Emmett, and beg him to take her back, though she had been the one who’d broken it off. But, she stood there, at the water’s edge, rooted to the spot.

Unable to tear her eyes away from Leah Clearwater, Rosalie watched the shape-shifter swim toward her with powerful, purposeful strokes.


	4. Clashing of Tides

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leah and Rosalie get better acquainted with each other...down by the river.

In spite of her resolve not to think about Rosalie, Leah found her mind wandering down that path of its own accord. Maybe it was due to the soothing, rocking motion of the water, the warmth of the sun, or a combination of both. Whatever it was, Leah felt more relaxed than she had ever felt before, and her thoughts were completely unfettered.

With her eyes closed, Leah had nothing else to distract her from the thoughts of Rosalie that had been trying to plague her since she’d first imprinted on the unnatural being shortly after the joint confrontation with the Volturi. Leah hadn’t been happy about their forced allegiance with the bloodsuckers, but then the impossible had happened to her as it had to Jacob, and she’d imprinted. It was unconscionable. Appalling.  It was something that she had no control over, and that infuriated her more than anything else.

In the months which had followed the imprint, Leah’d had a lot of time to think, and she’d come to the startling realization that it wasn’t that she’d imprinted on a woman, or even that she’d imprinted on a bloodsucker that made her so angry. No, the anger that she felt had nothing to do with any of that, but rather with the fact that the choice of whom she would love and spend the rest of her life with had been stolen from her.

She, her brother, Seth, Quil, Embry, Paul, none of them had any say in what they were, or who they could and could not love. It wasn’t fair. That’s what Leah fought so hard against, and why she’d run when she’d imprinted, rather than confessing and giving into its impulse.

She’d given little thought to Rosalie in all of this, though, now she turned her mind toward the bloodsucker. Rosalie would be drawn to her – like a moth to a flame – unable to resist the pull of the imprint, causing her to leave her mate, as Sam had left her when he’d imprinted on Emily. Though she hated the bloodsuckers, Leah refused to do that to them. Leaving as she had, Leah spared Rosalie, and her mate, the pain and heartache that she was currently experiencing.

She was being merciful to a bloodsucker. It was laughable. Protecting the very thing she hated, and causing herself unbearable pain in the process. She should be committed to a loony bin. But, she’d finally accepted what she was, and who’d she’d imprinted upon. For better or for worse, Leah would move heaven and earth to provide whatever it was that Rosalie Hale needed, and if that was for her to deny her feelings for the vampire and disappear from La Push, for good, she’d do it.

She refused to rip Rosalie and Emmett apart. She might not be able to control the imprint, but she would control what she did with it. Leah would leave the pack, become a lone wolf, and wander the earth solo. Having made peace with her decision, Leah smiled.

Picturing Rosalie’s finely honed cheeks, honey blonde locks fanning her porcelain face, and her fiery, dark eyes, Leah stretched and dove down to the bed of the river. She plucked a smooth, round stone the color of gypsum encircled by a thin coral line, from the sandy bottom. Clutching it tightly in a fist, she swam for the surface. 

When she burst out of the water, she looked toward the shore, and saw a goddess, backlit by the sun, standing there. Unable to resist the strong pull, she swam. Her heart thundered in her chest, and her mouth felt dry as a bone. Cliché as it was, Leah knew that today would be the first day of the rest of her life.

_Rosalie_ , the name seemed to be carried to her on the wind, and Leah’s heart skipped a beat. She shivered when she reached the shore and stepped out of the water. She matched the goddess’ hard glare with one of her own.

Throwing caution to the wind, Leah stalked toward the vampire and pressed her lips to Rosalie’s. She was done with fighting the inevitable. Whether fate or destiny or some other force was at work, Leah didn’t give a damn. All she knew was that, against all odds, Rosalie was here, standing in front of her, and kissing back with lips so cold that they burned.

* * *

 

“You’ve imprinted,” Rosalie said when Leah pulled away to breathe.

She wasn’t sure how to feel – angry, disgusted, or flattered. She’d left her family to clear her head, and ended up walking into a much bigger mess than she’d left behind.

The naked shape-shifter stood in front of her neither confirming nor denying Rosalie’s suspicion. Water gathered and beaded on her skin, glistening in the sun like gemstones. Rosalie’s hand seemed to move of its own accord, her lacquered nails skimming over high set cheekbones before trailing over Leah’s lips.

Leah’s dark eyes roamed over Rosalie, assessing her reactions, no doubt trying to determine whether or not she would attack her. Rosalie would have laughed, but for some strange reason she couldn’t.

Fear, lust, disgust, and self-loathing were all present in the younger woman’s eyes. Rosalie was startled by the depth of Leah’s emotions directed at her. She’d never understood Jacob’s imprint on Renesemee; had never known that it had a reciprocal pull – imprinter to imprintee and imprintee to imprinter.

Leah swallowed, stepped closer, and, closing her eyes, she took Rosalie’s hand and brought it down to rest upon her breast. Rosalie stiffened, at first, and then she cupped Leah’s breast, and the preternatural warmth that radiated from Leah flowed up through her hand and along her arm. The shiver that coursed through Leah’s body in response to her touch caused something important to shift inside of Rosalie.

Rosalie leaned in and tentatively sniffed the shape-shifter. She was pleasantly surprised to find that Leah didn’t smell like wet dog. Instead, she smelled like a spring meadow – lavender, lilac, freshly mown grass and daffodils. 

“Sorry,” Leah whispered, and her shoulders sagged. She looked so young. So vulnerable. Afraid.

She took a step back, but Rosalie caught her by the wrist and refused to let her go. The shape-shifter’s eyes snapped open and her nostrils flared as she glared at Rosalie and tried to shake herself free.

Rosalie’s lips curled in a snarl and she tugged Leah back toward her. Leah’s eyes grew dark, and she growled low in her throat. If Rosalie hadn’t been so focused on making the girl stay, she would have been afraid. Leah’s skin rippled beneath her hands – the one she still had on the woman’s breast, and the one she had on her wrist.

“You’re the one who imprinted on me,” Rosalie hissed at her. “Control yourself, wolf.”

“You think I wanted this?” Leah’s voice was a quiet rumble, and her eyes flashed gold. “To imprint on a bloodsucking _leech_?”

Rosalie laughed mirthlessly. “Something I’ve learned over the last half a century, _love_ , is that we don’t always get what we want.”

Moved by an inner force that Rosalie was unable, or unwilling, to control, she squeezed Leah’s breast until the younger woman gasped, and then she took her mouth in a bruising kiss.

Lips and eyes locked in a battle that neither of them wanted to lose, and neither had a hope in hell of winning. They were both bound to a mutual destiny by something outside of themselves.

Rosalie knew that Leah’s breast would bear an impression of her hand – fingers splayed out around the taut nipple and over the plump, dark mound– but she didn’t care. She wanted to mark Leah. Not as some kind of sick punishment, but because there was some part of her that wanted others to know that this woman was hers. It was a strange impulse, and Rosalie didn’t understand where it had come from, but she wasn’t in a position to question it.

Leah squirmed within her grip, her wet skin slippery. Rosalie liked the challenge that it offered. Like hunting trout in a stream.

As she deepened the kiss, Rosalie let her hand slide lower, from breast to stomach, to pubic hair. The coarse curly mass of dark hair was not unlike Emmett’s. She spread her fingers through it, lightly tugging and rubbing at the thick ringlets.

Leah’s lips parted in a soundless gasp when the tips of Rosalie’s fingers touched the hood of her clitoris. Rosalie pressed the advantage, tasting wild berries and elk’s blood on Leah’s tongue.

Leah moaned when Rosalie rubbed her index and middle finger over the woman’s clitoris and started to apply a gentle, pulsing sensation on the small nub. A warm liquid spread over Rosalie’s fingers, and Leah’s knees buckled. Rosalie moved with her, both of them kneeling in the silt at the river’s edge.

Leah started to pant and moan and Rosalie’s fingers grew slick as she continued to caress and fondle her.  Leah leaned back on her elbows, opening her legs wide, and jerking her hips upward, increasing the friction between them.

This was different than it had been with Emmett. Rosalie was half-draped over Leah, the fingers of her right hand were pumping and rubbing and gliding over Leah’s clitoris, and then she was pushing them tentatively into the woman’s vagina. She had no idea how to do this, had only pleasured herself a handful of times before, but, judging by the sounds that Leah was making, she wasn’t doing half bad.

She used her left hand to anchor herself. Though Leah was stronger than a mortal woman, Rosalie was cognizant of their differences, and, aside from the smattering of bruises that she’d already marked the girl with, she didn’t want to hurt her.

Rosalie’s lips roamed from Leah’s mouth to the edge of her jawline, and down along her throat. Leah’s back arched, her breasts pointing up toward the sky, and Rosalie latched onto the breast she hadn’t yet marked, suckling at the nipple, rolling her tongue around it, and then biting, but not hard enough to break the skin.

Rosalie lost herself in the act of fucking Leah until the bronze-skinned girl was screaming out her name like her very life depended upon it. And then, when Leah’s toes dug into the mud and silt, and she threw her head back, baring her throat, Rosalie bit and drank, relishing the wild, tangy taste of her lover’s blood, until Leah shuddered and shouted and then collapsed beneath her.

Rosalie cleaned up the remnants of blood on the already closing wound, and she drew Leah to herself, savoring the warmth as it stole through her own cooler body.

She cradled the shape-shifter’s head in her lap. Leah’s heart was beating loud and steadily, and her eyes, though half-closed, were locked on Rosalie’s. Her lips were quirked upward in a slight smile, and she reached a shaky hand toward Rosalie’s face, cupping her cheek with a warm hand.

“That was…” she yawned, and blinked sleepily. Unable to finish her thought, the woman fell asleep, and Rosalie ran her fingers through her hair wondering what the hell had come over her, and how it was that she had fallen in love with someone she’d deemed an enemy not too long ago.

Whether it was the act of Leah’s imprinting on her or something else entirely, Rosalie didn’t care. All she knew was that, without Leah, life would hold no meaning for her. She wondered if this is what it had been like for Edward when he’d first set eyes on Bella, or Carlisle when he’d fallen for Esme, or Alice when she’d been drawn to Jasper.

Whatever it was – the imprint, or true love – Rosalie wasn’t going to question it. She brushed back the hair that had plastered itself across Leah’s face, and pressed her cool lips to the girl’s forehead, murmuring quiet words of comfort when the woman stirred in her arms.

_Love_. It was something that Rosalie thought she’d had with Emmett, but what she’d had with him had been infatuation, borne from a fear of eternal loneliness. She wondered if the affable vampire would find someone who loved him the way he deserved to be loved, the way that she could never love him. The way she loved Leah.

As she watched Leah sleep, Rosalie vowed to protect the other woman, and soaked up the warmth that emanated from her. It was strange, feeling so warm, after what already felt like an eternity of cold. Life with Leah would be interesting. Amazing. Unforgettable.

Rosalie traced Leah’s parted lips with her finger, and watched the younger woman’s brow furrow in sleep. She smoothed her furrowed brow and shushed her, already chasing away the nightmares.


	5. Through a Veil of Tears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leah dreams, and when she wakes, Rose is there.

Leah dreamt.

_She was running through the woods, chasing a deer. But, she wasn’t alone. She turned her head to the left, quirking her ears to listen, but she couldn’t see or hear who the interloper was. Leah could only **feel** the presence of another. _

_Turning her attention back to the hunt, Leah continued to run. Trees and bushes rushed past her in a wild, blurring motion as she ran, closing in on her prey, envisioning the kill seconds before it happened._

_She liked this. The freedoms that came from being a wolf and running, killing. Her heart hammered in her chest, her paws pounded over the earth at supernatural speeds. She glanced off trees, barely noticing the pain. She didn’t feel the branches tugging at her fur. She flew over the ground, and her mysterious, faceless counterpart kept pace with her._

_Cornered in a clearing, the deer regarded her with wide, panicked eyes that roamed the woods behind Leah, as though it could find help for itself. The deer blew a hot breath that crystallized in the cold air. Leah shivered, and turned. Eyes, the color of topaz set in an artistically chiseled white face framed by dark, golden curls, greeted her._

_The blood-lips moved as the goddess of the hunt spoke, and Leah strained her ears to hear what she said, but there was no sound._

“It’s time to wake up, Leah,” a gentle, lilting voice roused her from sleep, and Leah thought that maybe she loved the owner of the voice. 

Leah wondered how she’d lost an entire summer to winter. It was so cold. She felt like she was sleeping on a bed of ice.

She woke in stages, coming to awareness as though peeling away layers of clothing.

_Clothing._ She frowned. She’d left that back at the edge of the Cullens’ property. She was naked.

She’d run. She’d been a wolf, but she wasn’t in her wolf form now. When and why had she shifted?

She remembered swimming. The water had been cool, refreshing. She’d been able to think clearly. Had come to the decision that she would leave La Push and Forks for good. She was willing to sacrifice her family and pack, her very life and happiness for Rosalie Hale’s.

She didn’t owe the vampire anything, but Leah felt compelled to do everything in her power to ensure that Rosalie Hale was protected, even from her. 

Leah knew that something important had happened, but she her mind was still foggy from sleep. When the cobwebs began to clear, she attempted to move, only to find that her body hurt and ached, much in the same way it had after she and Sam Uley had made love.

They’d been together, like that, less than a handful of times, but Leah remembered well what it had felt like to be bedded by Sam. He’d been a good lover, and Leah liked to think that she, for a virgin, hadn’t been too awful.

She hadn’t been Sam’s first – that honor had been bestowed on some white skinned, blue-eyed, twenty-year-old woman – but, he’d been hers, and she’d fallen for him, hard.

It hadn’t been easy getting over Sam when he’d taken up with Emily Young. Leah’d hated Emily, had envied the scars that Sam had left on her face when he’d scored her with his claws. She hated Sam. She hated herself.

“Leah?” the soft, heavenly voice called to her, and gentle, cool lips pressed against her forehead. “You with me yet?”

Leah was tired. Rested. Confused.

She wanted to wake, but wanted to go back to the dream where she was running through the words with a golden-haired, topaz-eyed paladin. A companion who would never leave her as Sam had. If she opened her eyes, she’d be giving that up, and Leah, for all of her outward hardness, longed for love. She fought so hard to be on her own, because she feared that is where she belonged, that she’d never love again, after Sam, and worse, she feared that there was something wrong with her, that she was unlovable.

Leah ignored the voice in favor of returning to the dream. To love. To belonging. To hope that maybe she wouldn’t have to be on her own forever.

“Leah,” the voice was harder, more insistent, and this time the lips were pressed to hers, and the icy cold of them burned her.

Her eyes flew open, and Leah breathed in sharply. Doe’s blood, mint and some other flavor that Leah didn’t recognize flitted across her tongue, the cloying scent of blood stuck in her nostrils. Brown eyes flecked with gold were staring down into hers. There were a myriad of emotions shining in them: worry, fear, amusement, love.

Leah blinked in wonder, and then her mind caught up with her. She moved to cover her breasts with her hands, but Rosalie, with a smile not unlike that of a cat about to pounce on a mouse, stilled her movements with another kiss.

“You’ve been sleeping forever,” Rosalie said when she broke off the kiss. She leaned back and regarded Leah with an indulgent half smile.

Leah scowled at her, and struggled out of Rosalie’s lap.

“Yeah, well, some of us need sleep,” she said, and angrily drew her knees up to her chest and hugged them to herself.

She’d never felt so naked in her life, and felt the heat of a blush as it crept over her skin when she remembered what had happened between them at the river’s edge. She closed her eyes and bit down on her bottom lip to keep from crying.

She’d never felt this emotional when she’d slept with Sam. Sure, she’d fallen in love after the first time they’d slept together, but she hadn’t felt off keel with Sam. She’d felt…she’d felt…Leah couldn’t remember how she felt with Sam.

When Rosalie had fucked her at the water’s edge – they hadn’t made love; it had been too animalistic, too needy for such a sentimentally wrought phrase – she’d felt…undone, boneless, like she was about to spontaneously combust at any moment, and if she did, she’d die a happy, satisfied woman. She’d never felt that way with Sam, and part of her felt like she was betraying the man for even thinking that.

A lone tear ran down her cheek and she rubbed her cheek over her knee and tried to get her emotions under control. She was Leah Clearwater. She did not come undone. She was strong and hale and hearty. She didn’t cry, or melt into a puddle of goo after making out with someone.

She shook, and wished that she had some clothes stashed somewhere close by. She hated this. Hated feeling vulnerable. Hated that she’d imprinted on Rosalie, and that the vampire had found her. She should have run faster and longer and further.

“I’m…sorry,” Rosalie said, hesitantly, and Leah wondered if those words had ever passed the vampire’s lips before. Rosalie struck her as someone who did what she wanted and made no apologies to anyone for anything.

“I…I don’t know what overcame me. I’ve…” Rosalie trailed off and Leah titled her head so that she could see the vampire out of the corner of her eye. There was an almost pained look on the vampire’s face. One that looked equally fetching and foreign.

Another tear stole its way down her cheek, and Leah buried her face in her knees. She hated crying and didn’t understand why she was crying now. She hadn’t cried with Sam. Not even when he’d broken things off with her in favor of Emily, the one he’d _imprinted_ on.

Rosalie hadn’t hurt her. What she’d done had felt good, and right, and Leah wanted her to do that again, and maybe she’d even reciprocate by doing the same for Rosalie. Thinking all of this only served to confuse her more than she already was, and the tears started flowing freely. She had nowhere to hide, and didn’t have the energy to shift and run again, even if she wanted too. And, that was another thing, she didn’t know if she wanted to run.

“Did I hurt you?” Rosalie asked quietly, tentatively.

Leah shook her head, but didn’t look at the vampire. She was sobbing like she had when she was a little girl and she’d had a terrible nightmare. She stiffened when she felt Rosalie drape an arm around her, but when the vampire started rubbing circles in her back, like her mother used to do when she was little, she cried harder.

xxx

Leah’s tears startled and confused her, and Rosalie wasn’t sure what to do. She’d watched the shape-shifter sleep for what had felt like an eternity, but according to the sun’s movement across the sky, had only been a few hours.

Leah was a comely woman. Her breasts, fully formed and bountiful, were twin peaks of beauty. Her lips, bruised and swollen from kissing were shaped like a heart – full and rounded. They just begged to be kissed.

Even closed in sleep, Rosalie found herself haunted by the memory of Leah’s eyes – furious and mesmerizing; they were a dark chocolate, flecked with tiny speckles of jade. Her jaw, so often stubbornly set, was square. Her chin, subtly rounded.

The woman’s skin was soft and supple, and Rosalie liked how it felt and moved beneath her fingertips. She liked the way that her touch elicited goose bumps on the too warm flesh. She liked how dark Leah was compared to her. How the woman’s cheeks pinked when she was flushed, and how she didn’t need makeup to achieve that look.

Leah was muscled. She wasn’t some pampered princess. She was sinewy and strong and lithe. Powerful and swift as a tigress.

Rosalie didn’t know what she was supposed to do now. Emmett had never cried. She’d left tears behind when she’d been raped and left for dead. There were times when she wished that she could cry, but it had been so long, that, if she was afforded the opportunity to do so again, she wasn’t sure that she’d know how to.

There was a part of her that was jealous of Leah. Jealous that the woman could show her emotions through the blushing of her skin, and tears. They were such small, simple things, and yet so powerfully telling.

“’M sorry.” Leah’s voice was muffled from the tears, and her head was still buried in her knees.

“I wish I could cry,” Rosalie confessed after a moment’s hesitation.

She didn’t understand this whole imprinting thing, and didn’t owe Leah a damn thing, but she felt drawn to the shape-shifter in a way that she’d never been drawn to Emmett. She wasn’t sure if it was due to what had happened (what she’d done) at the river’s edge, or if it was part and parcel of the whole imprinting thing.

Whatever the cause, Rosalie was no longer her own. She belonged to Leah and Leah to her. It was nothing like what she and Emmett had shared. This wasn’t a one-sided love. It wasn’t lust. It wasn’t anything, and yet it was everything.

“No you don’t,” Leah said, breaking the silence.

The woman chuffed, and her shoulders shook with quiet laughter. She turned her head and Rosalie saw that, though her eyes were red-rimmed from tears, they were sharp and focused. Keen with intelligence that would be able to match wit to wit with hers. Something else which differed with what she had shared with Emmett. The vampire was handsome and winsome, but he was no great intellect.

“Crying makes your eyes puffy and gives you a stuffed nose, and it makes you look ugly,” Leah said, lifting her head. She let out a shuddering breath and wiped at her eyes with the palm of her hand.

Rosalie quirked an eyebrow and plucked a lock of hair from Leah’s eyes. She searched the woman’s face. Yes, her eyes were puffy and red from crying, and she could see a thin, clear line of snot dripping from Leah’s nose and edging its way toward her upper lip.

Moved by something indefinable, Rosalie surged forward and kissed the girl. She kissed Leah’s lips, and licked the salty trail the tears had left on her cheeks. She kissed the lids of Leah’s eyes and the tip of her nose, and she drew away with a sharp intake of breath that she didn’t even need when Leah’s hands wrapped around her neck. They sat there, on the forest floor, forehead to forehead, staring into each other’s eyes for what must have been an eternity before Rosalie shook herself.

She frowned, and wished that she understood what was happening, why her heart – that dead, un-beating organ – was aching with a longing she’d never felt for Emmett, or anyone else, even prior to her life as a vampire. It felt like her heart was beating, and that, if she wanted to, she could cry. But, non of that happened.

Leah kissed her, pressing her warm, human lips to hers. She kissed her. Leah’s tongue darted into her mouth and the girl was tasting, mapping out the contours, and memorizing.

It was a slow, leisurely kiss, and Rosalie found herself wishing that it could last forever. Their lips and tongue clashed, and their teeth clanged, and at one point, Leah sucked at her neck with such force that Rosalie wondered if she would leave a bruise.

The kiss ended far too soon for Rosalie’s liking. Leah drew in air with long, trembling breaths, and then smiled at her and gave her a quick, playful peck on the lips.

In a flash so quick that, even with her keen vampire eyesight and speed, Rosalie had trouble following and countering, Leah disentangled herself from Rosalie’s arms. The woman stood, stretched, and with a challenging look cast over her shoulder, she transformed into a wolf with light grey fur and started running.

Laughing, Rosalie stood and gave chase. She had no idea what the future would hold for her and Leah, but she was not opposed to finding out, and she thought that maybe Alice might know a thing or two about it. Her sister might not be able to see Leah in all of this, but she could see her, and whatever she’d seen had encouraged her to tell Rosalie that she’d return, and that everything would work out better than she could imagine.

And, with Leah by her side, Rosalie found that she could imagine a great deal many good things for the uncertain future that stretched out ahead of them.


	6. Rebirth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leah's presence brings balance to the family, and the future is bright.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter jumps forward in time, quite a bit. Also, canon realities (such as Leah losing her period) are blatantly disregarded. (Seth and Emmett are paired)
> 
> Additional note - the term auntie and uncle is used as a term of respect by youth. I guess I've taken that for granted, hearing it all of the time, and being called auntie by children who aren't relatives by blood. In tight-knit cultures, like the one that Seth is from, this would be a common term used (at least from my personal experience).

Leah enjoyed watching Rosalie, the vampire moved with such poise and grace that it looked to Leah like she was floating across the ground rather than walking on it. Rosalie was attractive, and Leah often found herself wondering what the vampire saw in her when she looked at her and told her that she was beautiful.

Especially now, with her belly fat and round as a whale, her ankles swollen to the point that they were no longer recognizable as ankles, but looked like an extension of her calves. She couldn’t even see her feet, and she was only six months pregnant. She wondered, not for the first time, if she was having twins.

No matter how often Carlisle reassured her that she wasn’t, Leah could look at her belly and argue with him. _No one should be this big if they weren’t having twins_ , she’d say.

The ease with which Rosalie’s family had accepted her into their fold had made her feel shame for the hatred she’d shown them for so long. Even Emmett had expressed no ill-will toward her when she’d confessed that she’d imprinted on Rosalie.

“You’re going to burst a blood vessel thinking that hard,” Alice said, grabbing her by the hand, and tugging her into the house.

Leah pouted, but followed along after Alice. Of all of them, Alice was the one that Leah found the hardest to say no to. She had a feeling that it was the same way for everyone else. No one could refuse Alice Cullen anything, not that they even tried to tell her no anymore.

Jasper gave her an easy smile, and placed a hand on her belly. “He’s happy,” he said. “You shouldn’t worry so much, Leah.”

It never ceased to amaze Leah how at ease Jasper was around her. Alice had told her that it was because she exuded calmness (now that she was no longer angry at the world) and he found her company soothing.

Apparently she had helped bring a balance to the family – Alice’s words, not hers. Leah still found it strange to think that she, as bitter as she’d been when all of this had started, could bring balance and peace to anyone or anything.

Leah returned his smile, but still couldn’t shake the sense of unease that had settled over her when Seth had imprinted.  Sam and the others had all but ostracized them when Seth had imprinted on Emmett. They’d said that her imprinting on Rosalie and Seth’s more recent imprint, in the past month and a half, on Emmett were unnatural and had only happened because they’d chosen to follow Jacob’s leadership.

Sam and the others still protected the lands, and the pact that had been established between all three parties held. It was still considered a ‘sin’ to harm someone that one of them had imprinted upon, but there was a distinct schism that Leah felt sharply.

“I’m trying not to,” Leah said, and rolled her eyes when Alice sat her at the kitchen counter and started setting a variety of food in front of her.

She’d never been a picky eater, until she got pregnant. Now, almost everything she had enjoyed before undergoing artificial insemination – something which Seth had suggested that she offer to Rosalie when their first year anniversary had come around – tasted like sawdust.

Foods, and combinations of foods that she would never have considered eating before, were the new norm for her: peanut butter, pickle, bologna sandwiches; caviar on mint ice cream; wild strawberries and raw elk’s meat…

Leah was happy to be giving Rosalie something that she knew the vampire had always wanted – a child – but some days, it was hard to be pregnant and bloated, and feeling like the ugliest, fattest creature on the planet. She grimaced, and added a dollop of sour cream to the caviar sundae Alice sat in front of her. She closed her eyes and moaned when she took a bite.

“This is…” the rest of Leah’s sentence was cut off by a jealous, hungry kiss.

She frowned when the kiss ended prematurely, and opened her eyes to find Rosalie glaring at Alice and Jasper who looked about as worried as a lion with a deer carcass. Actually, if she had to put a word to the twin expressions that Jasper and Alice shared, she’d have to say that they looked pleased.

“Told you it would work,” Alice whispered indiscreetly to Jasper who nodded and passed her a folded bill.

“Wait a minute; did you two make some kind of bet?” Leah felt her hackles rise, and, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a pleased, yet feral grin on Rosalie’s face.

Jasper’s eyes grew wide and he sidled behind his wife who stood her ground. Leah slammed the spoon onto the counter and narrowed her eyes at the two vampires. She felt, more than saw, Rosalie move to stand next to her.

“It was her idea,” Jasper said, throwing his wife to the wolves so to speak.

Alice held her chin up high, and Jasper wrapped his arms around her, protectively. Leah’s emotions were wild and not easy for her to control at the moment, and her anger at being used as bait to draw Rosalie away from spying (discreetly) on Emmett and Seth abated almost as soon it had started.

Despite the age difference between her brother and Emmett, Leah trusted the vampire, and knew that he would take things slowly with Seth. It was kind of sweet, watching the two of them as they navigated their new relationship together. Rosalie’s overprotectiveness over Leah’s little brother was equal parts touching and annoying, but Leah wasn’t complaining. She loved the blonde and found her quirks endearing.

Seeing Emmett and Seth together gave Leah a new perspective on imprinting. It was obvious to her that the two were meant to be together. It was like the proverbial, match made in heaven. Watching the two of them, Leah finally felt like she understood imprinting, and how it was a blessing, rather than a curse.

Seth and Emmett, for all their similarities, complemented each other nicely as well. Emmett had a depth of maturity that had not manifested until after Seth had imprinted on him. It was as though something had been awakened inside of the vampire that would not have had Seth not imprinted on him. She wondered if the same thing had happened with her and Rosalie.

There was a small part of Leah that worried Rosalie would be jealous of what Seth and her former lover had, but she soon learned that she needn’t have feared that. If anything, the vampire was fiercely protective of Seth.

Leah sagged in her seat at the counter, and pulled Rosalie closer so that she could kiss her properly and then dug into her unorthodox sundae before it melted.

“Ew.” Rosalie’s nose scrunched up as she watched Leah eat. “I love you, but that is disgusting.”

“Does that mean no cuddling tonight?” Leah asked around a pout, knowing that Rosalie would sooner kiss Jacob Black than not join her in bed.

Rosalie gave her a dark, narrowed eyed look and turned on her heel. She strode purposefully out of the kitchen muttering something about temperamental wolves and overindulgent vampire siblings.

Later that night, Leah lay in bed, snuggled in the crook of Rosalie’s arm while the vampire rested a palm on her belly. They both watched in awe as the baby moved inside of her – its elbows and feet making strangely shaped lumps in her belly, stretching it. It was the most amazing-strange thing, and Leah wished that she could switch bodies with Rosalie for even a few minutes, so that the vampire could feel the baby move inside of her.

“Thank you,” Rosalie said. She clasped Leah’s hand in her own, and kissed their conjoined fingertips. “You can’t know what this means to me.”

She pressed her lips to Leah’s in a lingering kiss that was as passionate as the first time that they’d kissed. The baby kicked, and Leah’s heart fluttered. Any misgivings that Leah might have had about bringing a child into the world and parenting him or her alongside a vampire vanished.

* * *

 

Rosalie knew that this was a much different situation than it had ben when Bella had given birth to Renesemee, but she couldn’t shake her fears off that easily. Leah had looked deathly pale when she’d last seen her. Carlisle had asked for Edward’s help with the home delivery.

Rosalie wanted to be in the delivery room, with her wife, but she’d been banished when she’d gone into a rage and attacked Edward. She’d hunted and fed the day before, and would never attack Leah or the baby, but when Edward had told Leah to wait and the woman had screamed in pain, Rosalie had seen red.

She’d grown fiercely protective of Leah over the almost two years that they’d been together, and now that the woman was having their child, Rosalie would not listen to reason. She paced outside of the delivery room, wringing her hands and grimacing whenever Leah cursed or screamed in pain. She wanted nothing more than to take the other woman’s pain on herself.

Leah’s willingness to endure all of this for her touched Rosalie in a way that nothing ever had before. She’d watched as the woman’s belly swelled, and, though she’d wanted to be pregnant once upon a time, Rosalie didn’t envy Leah the honor of bearing a child. Leah had shared every facet of the pregnancy with her, and Rosalie had treasured every moment of it – aside from the awful food cravings.

She’d been alive for almost a full century, but this was the first time that Rosalie felt like she understood the true meaning of love: sacrifice; putting the good of others before one’s self; patience; overlooking a wrong, even to one’s own hurt; endurance; tolerance; protecting and fighting for what was right. These were the hallmarks of love, and were the very things that seemed to come naturally to Leah and to her, when Leah was in the equation.

Rosalie had hated it when Jacob had imprinted on Renesemee. There was still no love lost between her and the wolf, but she’d begrudgingly come to accept him as a member of her family. After Leah had imprinted on her, and their lives had been transformed as they’d fallen in love, Rosalie had finally begun to understand that imprinting wasn’t the anathema that she’d thought it was.

It was a blessing, and she was grateful that, of every possibility that the young woman had, Leah had imprinted on her. Rosalie knew that it hadn’t been the shape-shifter’s choice. Likewise, she knew that, had Leah been able to choose, she would not have chosen her at all. She would have chosen someone else better suited to her, one of her own kind, and Rosalie would have remained with Emmett – the both of them unhappy, going through the motions, and pretending that it was love.

Leah screamed and cursed and Rosalie’s hand was on the door, the knob twisting in her grip. A hand grabbed her wrist and she struggled to free herself, hissing and baring her teeth at the unlucky offender. It was Emmett. He shook his head and pulled her away from the door. Seth, looking as pale as a ghost, stood behind him, his eyes darted to the door when another heartrending scream rent the air.

“Is she going to be okay?” he asked, placing a hand on Emmett’s arm.

Emmett nodded. “Your sister’s in very good hands. She’s going to be fine.” Though he was answering Seth’s question, he was looking at Rosalie, speaking to her as well, offering her comfort.

“Carlisle and Edward have done this sort of thing many times before,” he assured Seth who’d cast a worried look at the door when Leah had cried out again.

“She sounds like she’s in pain,” Seth whispered.

Emmett nodded. “Giving birth hurts,” he spoke plainly, and Seth’s brow furrowed, but he nodded.

“Why don’t we all go downstairs and wait there?” Emmett suggested when Leah let out a colorful string of curses that had Seth’s eyes growing as wide as saucers.

“I need to be here,” Rosalie said, pleading, but no longer fighting Emmett’s hold on her wrist. “With her.”

“Auntie Rose,” Seth spoke quietly, as though afraid. “I think it’d be okay if you went downstairs with us. Leah’s not going to mind. I don’t think she’d want you to hurt so much.”

“I promised her that I’d be by her side,” Rosalie said.

“This is all my fault,” Seth blurted when Leah shouted something undecipherable. “I was the one who said that if she loved you, she’d give you a baby…I’m sorry, Auntie Rose. This wouldn’t be happening if I’d kept my big mouth shut.” It was unusual for Seth to be so serious. He, like Emmett was playful and lighthearted.

Rosalie had wondered where Leah had come up with the idea, and the two of them had discussed it at length – going over the pros and cons – before agreeing that they wanted to have and raise a child together. She knew that, initially, Leah had only broached the subject because she knew that Rosalie wanted a baby, and had grown angry and bitter when that had been stolen from her. But, over the course of their discussions, Leah had come to want a child, not just for Rosalie, but for herself as well.

“Seth,” Rosalie said, pulling the young shape-shifter into a hug, “this isn’t your fault, and Emmett’s right, this is normal. I’m just…frustrated that I can’t be in that room, with your sister right now.”

“Why can’t you?” Seth asked.

“I…”

“She almost killed your Uncle Edward,” Carlisle popped his head out of the door, and broke into their conversation. “But, if you can control yourself…” Carlisle’s brows lifted, and he gestured into the room beyond him where Edward was coaxing Leah to breathe, and the woman was panting and cursing Edward as she attempted to breathe the way he was modeling for her.

“I think your wife needs you,” Carlisle finished.

Rosalie didn’t wait to be asked twice, and she practically flew into the room with Emmett and Seth trailing behind her. Carlisle ushered Emmett, Seth and a somewhat ruffled looking Edward out of the room, but Rosalie didn’t even notice the hubbub. She walked over to Leah’s side, and took her hand in hers.

As Carlisle coached Leah through the process of giving birth, Rosalie bathed Leah’s forehead and fed her ice chips, and let her grip her hand as tightly as she needed to whenever she had a painful contraction. She listened to Leah curse out everyone from Mother Nature to her, and tried not to punch out the wall whenever Leah screamed in pain.

It pained her when Leah was in pain, but Rosalie grit her teeth and smiled encouragingly whenever Leah squeezed her hand in a bone crushing grip. Hours later and Rosalie wished that Leah had opted for the drugs that she’d refused.

Leah was exhausted and begging for Carlisle to cut the baby out of her, and Rosalie had no idea how her father could take it all in such stride and continue to smile as though nothing was amiss. He’d spoken to them at length about the birthing process. They’d read books, watched videos, learned about Lamaze, and none of it made this any easier.

“Just one more push, Leah,” Carlisle said. “One more push and he’ll be free.”

“He?” Leah questioned tiredly, and Carlisle smiled and nodded. Leah squeezed Rosalie’s hand and pressed her lips to the inside of Rosalie’s wrist.

“Just one more push, love,” Rosalie said, and she stroked Leah’s dark hair.

Her face screwed up with pain and she grunted and panted, and Rosalie did the breathing exercises with her. She bit down on her bottom lip when Leah pushed with a loud grunt, and Carlisle coached her to keep pushing.

“That’s it, you’re doing good,” Carlisle said, and Rosalie watched as Carlisle delivered their baby.

Leah collapsed back against the pillow when she’d finished pushing.

“Congratulations!” Carlisle shouted, and Edward came back into the room, bustling around doing things that Rosalie didn’t even see, because she only had eyes for Leah at that moment.

She pressed her lips to Leah’s sweaty forehead, cooling her, and she wiped the hair from her face.

“I love you,” Rosalie said, brushing her lips over Leah’s.

“I love you, too,” Leah whispered.

A soft, mewling sound reached their ears, and both women turned to look at their son as Carlisle laid him on Leah.

Leah examined him, touching his fingers and toes, and kissing the thick thatch of black hair that graced his head. “He’s perfect.”

Rosalie had never been this happy in her life. She’d thought that welcoming Renesemee into the world, and holding her little niece couldn’t be topped, but when Leah glanced at her out of the corner of her eye and held their son up for her, that moment paled in comparison to this.

Rosalie kissed her son on the forehead. “Welcome to the world, River Harold Hale Clearwater.”


	7. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leah reflects, and then some.

Leah watched her son play in the water at the river’s edge. Emmett and Seth were with him, and he was splashing them and squealing in delight. At three years old, he was a joy to every one of them.

He had his rebellious moments, and was as stubborn as both of his mothers – an expert at saying no and stomping his foot when he didn’t agree with something. But, he brought sunshine and love with him wherever he went. Seth said it was because of how he’d been brought into the world.

Rosalie sat beside her, shoulder-to-shoulder, hip-to-hip and hand-in-hand. Neither of them looked like they’d aged a day since they’d first met at that very river. Both of them had been running from their lives, trying to sidestep fate. Leah was glad that fate had intervened.

Leah picked at a blade of grass. “I’m glad that you came.”

“Why wouldn’t I come?” Rosalie gave her a puzzled look, and Leah smiled.

“I mean, I’m glad that you came that day.” She bumped her shoulder into Rosalie’s.

Rosalie’s lips curled in a decidedly wicked smile, and she leaned close to Leah’s ear and whispered low, so that neither Seth nor Emmett would overhear, “I believe that you are mistaken, my love.” Leah felt a blush creeping up into her cheeks when Rosalie continued, “You were the only one who came that day.” Rosalie wriggled her eyebrows suggestively and laughed when Leah growled at her.

Emmett looked up at them, and he seemed to be pondering something for a moment. “Hey, we’ve got little River covered here, if you two want to…”

“Go pick flowers, or something girly,” Seth interrupted with a fit of giggles. Emmett shook his head, and gave them an apologetic look. He smacked the younger man on the back of the head and then returned his attention to River who was asking to be spun around like helicopter. 

Leah wasted no time in pulling Rosalie to her feet and putting some space between them and the boys. She knew that River would be safe with Emmett and her brother. The vampire and wolf wouldn’t let anything or anyone hurt him.

When they’d put a few miles between themselves and the boys, they stopped running. Leah was panting, and struggling to catch her breath. It was times like these that she wished she was like Rosalie who looked like she’d taken a leisurely stroll through the park rather than run three miles at breakneck speed.

They regarded each other for a full second before breaking down and quickly divesting each other of their cumbersome clothing. Moments like these were rare for them. Though they had any number of volunteer babysitters on hand at home, they seldom had time to themselves.

“Let’s see if I can’t even the score.”

Leah pushed Rosalie to the ground and latched her mouth onto hers in a heated kiss. She knew that they didn’t have much time. River, though he loved playing with his uncles, would tire soon, and there was still the picnic lunch that Esme had packed for all of them to share.

She rubbed her body against Rosalie’s and laughed when the vampire shivered and moaned, arching up into her touch. She pushed her knee in between Rosalie’s legs, parting them, and then kissed her way down her lover’s neck.

Rosalie’s knees were hitched up to her waist and spread wide, allowing Leah complete access. Sealing her lips over a pert nipple, Leah suckled and teethed at the teat. Her own breasts, sensitive from recently weaning River, ached and hardened when Rosalie’s hands began to fondle and caress them.

Leah worked her way down Rosalie’s silky skin, pausing when she reached her goal – the darker, curly hair at her center. With an impish grin, Leah bent her head and she began to kiss the tender area nestled between Rosalie’s legs.

Rosalie’s hands fell to her side. Her toes and fingers dug into the mossy earth as she tried to anchor herself.

“Leah,” she whimpered, “ungh.” She arched her neck and back up off the ground and started slowly pumping her hips up into Leah’s mouth.

Leah used her lips and her tongue, working Rosalie into a quivering, stuttering mess of half-uttered moans. She tasted her lover, relishing the brackish flavor, and the way that Rosalie’s body responded to her touch – juddering and jerking, muscles clenching around her.

With a broken shout, that might’ve been Leah’s name, Rosalie climaxed, and she pulled a clump of dirt and moss from the earth, crushing it in her hand. Leah slowly and deliberately licked and kissed and sucked her way back up to Rosalie’s mouth.

Rosalie shook the dirt from her hands. “Fuck.”

Leah was lying on top of Rosalie. Their arms and legs were a tangled mess of limbs.  Leah merely turned her head to the side, and, running her fingers along the underside of Rosalie’s chin, eliciting goose bumps in their wake, she smiled.

“Thank you for coming,” Leah repeated the words she’d spoken earlier. The double entendre was made evident by her tone of voice.

Rosalie simply kissed the top of Leah’s head, and they lay together for a while, listening to the sounds of birds chirping and small animals going about their daily routines. It was comfortable, peaceful, and Leah didn’t want it to come to an end.

But, they donned their clothes, and, hand-in-hand, sprinted back to the river’s edge. Leah paused to pluck a handful of flowers on the way, knowing that Seth would expect them. When they were stepping free of the woods, the boys had just begun to lay out their picnic lunch. Emmett greeted them with a knowing smile, and River launched into a tale of gibberish that Leah pretended to understand.

Leah thought back to when she’d first imprinted on Rosalie. She was ashamed that she’d fled in fear and humiliation because she couldn’t stomach the thought of being bound, for life, to a bloodsucker. If Rosalie hadn’t found her that day, she wouldn’t have any of this – River, Emmett, Seth – a family.


End file.
